Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs) are the latest installment in the field of distance education. This presentation discusses the pros and cons of MOOCs in the educational systems with a special emphasis on the engineering education. Since 2012, more and more universities have been joining MOOC revolution and the number of online courses has considerably increased over time. Engineering MOOCs are also increasing. Due to their access to large audience, massive online courses have been expanding their horizon of admission to engineering education at all levels and improving the in-campus learning.

1. Towards MOOCs and Their Role
in Engineering Education
Sajid Iqbal
Ph.D student
Harbin Institute of Technology
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2. MOOCs became famous, when in the fall of 2011, a
professor of Stanford University conducted a course on
Artificial Intelligence.
Enrollment quickly reached 160,000 students from 190
countries; only 23,000 finished it. Since 2012, MOOCs
got attention of the universities, media and
entrepreneurs.
2012: Times year
of the MOOC
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3. 3
According to IEEE CS 2022 report, with
nanotechnology and quantum computing, MOOCs
are amongst top ten technologies that could change
the world by 2022.

4. Oxford online dictionary added the acronym
MOOC as, “ a course of study made available
over the Internet without charge to a very large
number of people”.
MOOCs have generated a paradigm shift in online
education by presenting free high-quality
education to anyone, anywhere with Internet
access. 4

5. The advent of MOOCs may seem abrupt, but they
are the next stage in the development of Open
Educational Resources (OERs).
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6. Initially, there was a lot of hype and no one was
quite sure what impact MOOCs will have on the
future of education.
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7. Each new instrument: blackboard, radio, motion
picture and television, was labeled the most
important advancement since Gutenberg’s
printing press.
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But from the start of new millennium, it has been claimed
that Information and Communication Technology (ICT) aids
could revolutionize education because they absorb all
these earlier innovations.

8. Some MOOC platforms are:
Google Course Builder
OER University
Class2Go
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9. Engineering education is the activity of teaching
knowledge and principles related to the
professional practice of engineering.
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Since engineering courses require prerequisites
like linear algebra, calculus, programming so in the
beginning upper-level engineering courses were
virtually absent from the MOOC list, but the
situation is changing.

10. For MOOCs, virtual and
remote labs can help.
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The laboratories are a unique
part of engineering education.

11. There is gradual rise in
the online courses of
science subjects.
Data collected from Nov
2014 to May 2015.
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This sustained increase in the science MOOCs and the
introductory level engineering MOOCs will bring in more
upper level engineering MOOCs in future.

12. Table I presents the MOOCs offered by Coursera. These
courses are not mutually exclusive. Some courses appear
under different headings. We have divided MOOCs into six
major categories as:
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13. Similarly, edX MOOCs have been segregated into six broad
groups. edX online courses are shown in Table II.
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14. Breakdown of
Coursera MOOCs
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Breakdown of edX
massive online
courses

15. Some issues in engineering MOOCs are:
Laboratory
Requirements
Evaluation
Completion
Rates
Accreditation Plagiarism Pedagogy
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16. MOOCs can be used as prerequisites and
introductory engineering courses.
They can also complement continuing professional
education (CPD) and certification preparation.
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